Speakout

In regard to the December letter about the idling ticket: It’s a law. While I disagree with some laws, we all have to follow them. If I told an officer I was driving 75 in a 65 mile-per-hour zone and got pulled over for speeding, would I have a leg to stand on?

If you don’t like the laws, then call your elected officials to get them changed. I am weary of hearing drivers harp about the U.S. DOT, split speed, lane restrictions, idling and whatever else the states want to impose and then see that the truckers do nothing about it. As truckers, we have the biggest voting block in the nation and do not know how to use it.

I live in Tennessee and can only work on the laws in my home state where I am a voter. I have contacted my congressman about the split speeds and other items but it does no good when only a few speak up. There is power in numbers: When 10 protest, no one cares, but when 10,000 speak up, everybody listens. When drivers learn that just because they have a CDL they have not given up their rights to change things, maybe some laws can be modified.

JIM McCRARY | Owner-operator | Cleveland, Tenn.

“This is our getting stuck across America tour.”

— Trucker Tyler Sweat, near then-closed I-70, told the St. Louis Post Dispatch Feb. 2 of his third layover due to blizzards with a load of furniture heading from Conover, N.C., to Seattle.

Cross-border plan would harm American small fleets

If a cross-border program with Mexico is reinstated, it will put most small trucking businesses out of business. The Mexican trucks will haul for nothing because of the cheaper fuel, junk trucks and probably cheaper insurance. Plus the U.S. Department of Transportation can’t take care of all the trucks now, so the Mexican trucks will run wild.

I have five trucks, which translates into five families and support personnel and suppliers who count on me for their living. It’s a huge burden to have Mexico try to compromise it. Oh well. Guess I’ll sell out and go on welfare: That’s what our government wants anyway.

TERRY TALBOT | Small fleet owner

Sterling, Kan.

What do you think of the plan to require electronic onboard recorders?

“It’s stupid. They’re just a bunch of tattle-tale machines. It needs to be the way it was years ago, so drivers can do their jobs right.”

RICHARD LOPEZ

San Antonio Texas | FSQ Trucking

“I don’t want to use one. If they say I have to, I’m just going to quit. I like things the way they are.”

EDDIE GREEN

Anderson, S.C. | Celadon Trucking

“If they’re used to just get in the way or harass drivers, they’re not doing anybody any good. If they’re used in the right way, they could be a good thing.”

RUSSELL FURR

Marks, Miss.

Leased to W.S. Thomas Transfer

“I don’t like it one bit. That’s it. I don’t like the idea of them at all.”